Millions of Americans and others around the world were transfixed to their televisions and computers Monday as the two major candidates vying to be the next leader of the free world traded blows during an often surreal debate that prompted one expat in Chapala to observe, “The United States has 340,000 million people and two bad candidates.”

Unfortunately, the campaign has centered more on the defects of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump than their attributes and vision for the United States and the world.

The first debate did nothing to alter this.

Michael Hogan, the Emeritus Humanities Chair at the American School Foundation of Guadalajara, was disheartened at the deficiencies of both candidates: “So sad to see the future leaders of our country engaged in a low level argument that was even embarrassing to our students at the American School. The kids made a list of the fallacies: hasty generalization, ad hominem, ad populum, false analogy, and non sequitur. Trump was clearly the worst offender, but Clinton wallowed in the same demeaning bog.”

While most news channels and reliable polls marked down the Democratic candidate as the clear “winner” of the debate, many viewers in Mexico were far from convinced.